Seeds of our own destruction

LAST July, as fragments of Comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 slammed into Jupiter, a newspaper cartoon showed worried Jovian dinosaurs looking at the sky and saying "Not again!". No, dinosaurs have not been discovered on Jupiter. The cartoon simply reminded us that on several occasions during Earth's geological history large proportions of its species have become extinct, perhaps due to the impact of comets and asteroids. Ecologists such as myself believe that the Earth is once again experiencing a mass extinction - only this time we are pointing the finger of blame at our own species.

Sceptics in economic and political circles disagree, some vehemently. In the words of Julian Simon, professor of business administration at the University of Maryland, estimates of high extinction rates are so much "statistical flummery". It is "facts, not species" that are in danger, he says.

It would be nice to be able to counter such scepticism ...

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